Saturday 10 January 2009

Save Our Forests!

The SNP Scottish Government has clearly attempted to sell off publicly owned Forestry Commission forests to private timberland companies with the plans hidden deep within the Climate Change Bill.

This would see the most commercially viable forests being leased for up to 75 years - possibly to foreign investors.

The forestry provisions in the Scottish Climate Change Bill can be read by clicking on the headline above.

Andrew Reeves of the Scottish Liberal Democrats has written a good piece on this in Liberal Democrat Voice - see http://www.libdemvoice.org/news-from-scotland-save-our-forests-9371.html.

A recent letter from the Environment Minister to the Convener of the Scottish Parliament's Rural Affairs and Environment Committee implies that the SNP has finally sussed that their discredited proposals to sell off swathes of Scotland’s forests is maybe not the best idea ever thought of. Let's hope that it is the case.

You can read more about the LibDem campaign to Save our Forests at http://www.scotlibdems.org.uk/saveourforests. The picture above features Jim Hume MSP, who is leading the Scottish Liberal Democrat campaign against this daft SNP proposal.